I recently defended my PhD from the Dr. Frank Aylward's Lab at Virginia Tech and will be starting as a Simons Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow in Marine Microbial Ecology at Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences in the single cell genomics lab of Dr. Ramunas Stepanauskas. My current work examines the evolution and ecology of bacteriophages (phages), viruses that infect bacteria using '-omics' data. I am particularly interested in jumbo phages, which are phages with really large genomes (> 200 kb). Until recently, they have been largely overlooked in both culture-based and sequencing studies due to their unusually large size that rivals bacteria!
As a career, I aim to apply microbial and viral ecology and evolution to conservation and ecosystem management and biotechnology, namely in marine systems. I particularly enjoy coding and data analysis, and I hope to work in data science that centers on viral and microbial datasets.
Born and raised in Reading, PA I stayed relatively close to home for my undergraduate studies, attending Penn State, WE ARE! While at Penn State and during summer internships, I pursued research projects that focused on coral microbiology and ecology in Dr. Iliana Baums's and Dr. Monica Medina's labs. My fascination with the secret powers of microbes in the ocean then led me to pursue a master's degree in marine microbiology, which brought me to the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology in Bremen, Germany. Prost! While in Bremen, I worked under Dr. Nicole Dubilier and Dr. Matthew Sullivan, using metagenomic data to examine the viruses associated with deep sea mussels. Through this project, I was inspired by the insights enabled by analyzing large '-omics' datasets, and I pursued my interest in studying marine microbiology using '-omics' data by joining Dr. Frank Aylward's Lab at Virginia Tech.
In addition to marine microbial/viral ecology and evolution, I am very passionate about science communication, and I aspire to include science journalism in my career. I am currently a co-editor of the ArcGIS StoryMaps blog Food, Water, and Communities, where graduate students share stories about the communities that inspire their research. Check out the Outreach tab for more info on my science communication projects. In my free time, I enjoy scuba diving (the header picture was taken while diving in a cenoté in Mexico), baking (obsessed with GBBO!), traveling, running, hiking, knitting, and playing guitar. I'm a huge music fan and loveee Led Zeppelin, the Arctic Monkeys, and the Strokes.